And Back To Reality

I've read at more than one site the list of pitchers who dropped off after having an excellent previous season where they jumped to more than 200 innings. Which, of course, is a group that Jon Lester is eligible for this year.

And while I am not stating we have to worry about him joining those ranks...yet, today had to give a Sox fan pause.

Lester had a solid first two innings before it came apart in the third. Though, to be fair, he limited the damage with that great double-play pitch to Longoria. But the fifth inning finished him. Even though, yet again, he was able to induce Longoria into a double-play. But a run still crossed and then Pena crushed that 3-1 pitch and that was just about it for Lester. The bottom line was 94 pitches in five innings and five earned runs on eight hits. That isn't a good line.

The rest of the pitching was a mixed bag. Delcarmen and Ramirez were great in relief. Saito was okay, even with the homer. But Javier Lopez was a mess. Even with a ton of first-pitch strikes, he gave up hit after hit. True, his one surrendered run wasn't the difference, but it didn't look good.

The batting wasn't much better. The entire bottom third of the order was an o-fer. The only guy who held up his end of the deal was Youk, who went 3-4 with an RBI. Pedroia and Ortiz were okay, each getting a hit and drawing a walk. But the lineup looked weak today.

But overreacting to this loss is as pointless as overreacting to the win last night. It hurts in that any loss is a bad loss. But Lester will pitch better, the bottom third of the lineup will get their hits and the bullpen will get stronger. That's the way it works and we all just have to exhibit the patience to take it that way.

As for the first pitch strike count, Lester got ahead of 11 of the 23 batters he faced. That translates out to about 48%, which is not a good placed to be as a pitcher when your job is to get ahead of the batter in the count. All together, of the 39 batters Boston pitching faced tonight they could only ahead of 22 of them from the get-go. That's a 56% success rate. And while collectively that stat improved for the Sox through the night, it was still poor overall. First pitch strikes are important to a team's success.

Look on the bright side; the Yankees haven't even won a game yet.

Next Game

April 9 / Home against Tampa / Matsuzaka vs. Garza / 1:35 PM